


Hate Week

by eruthiel



Category: MarsCorp (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, First Crush, Ice Cream, Minor Violence, Pre-Canon, Public Humiliation, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-06
Updated: 2016-09-06
Packaged: 2018-08-13 04:29:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7962472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eruthiel/pseuds/eruthiel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Pathetic little toff runt. It's no wonder they're starting to lose their marbles. They marry their cousins, kiddo. Anything to avoid contact with scum like you and me."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hate Week

**Author's Note:**

> [Now with a beautiful heart-rending illustration by jenga_time!!!](https://south-of-oz.tumblr.com/post/150420062151/pathetic-little-toff-runt-its-no-wonder-theyre) _LAUGH!_ at the totally justified suffering of Mars' first criminal! _GASP!_ at an innocent young Purple corrupted for life! Please I'm just so happy, nobody's ever drawn one of my fics before...
> 
> Title not from [Heretic Pride by the Mountain Goats,](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZ6O7Jk4MXs) but please bear it in mind anyway! (plant nerd david feelings ughgh)
> 
> This was drawn solely from episodes 1-6 and is based on my feelings from [this comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/MarsCorp/comments/50c1qk/part_6_appropriate_working_relationships/d77mm01): _She was nine. Just old enough to grasp the vague outline of the Incident but not the details; for all the subsequent talk about the Scary Evil Crazy Intern to filter through and form the bedrock of her nascent sexuality - and to nurture the rebellious attitude that would eventually lead her to Dave. I also find it incredibly exciting that the closest thing David has to a romantic interest rn is so vastly mismatched in terms of colour. What would the other true blues say... I bet it would be.... angsty >:)_

Hayley wakes to the sound of urgent, grown-up voices out in the corridor. It's still dark – not morning dark – middle of the night dark. It's too early for breakfast and school.

She sits up and stares at the shadowy outline of her mum, who has already rolled out of bed and is digging around on the floor for her shoes. "What is it?" Hayley stage-whispers. It's still night time, after all, even if there are people yelling outside their pod. "Mum, what's the matter? Where are you going?"

"Lie down, Hayley." Her mum zips up her jacket, no shirt underneath, and presses both hands to Hayley's head for a moment. "Listen to me. It's going to be okay. Lie down, wait for me, and sleep if you can. Look after Sam if he wakes up, but otherwise, don't get out of this bed, you hear me?" She pauses in the doorway. "I'll be back before you know it."

The door slams, leaving Hayley alone in the dark. She sits for a while and eavesdrops on the commotion outside. At first she wonders hopefully if it's some kind of weird party, a celebration she's never heard of before, but the longer she listens, the more she becomes convinced that something is wrong. There are hurried footsteps, back and forth, people crying and arguing and shushing one another. Her mum must be somewhere in the confusion.

Slowly, the noise dies down, or at least drifts away to another part of the base. Now Hayley can hear Sam breathing in his cot, just a few inches away in the dark. She lies down in the warm patch on the mattress, closes her eyes, and mumbles a small prayer to the shareholders for her mum's safe return. She listens to the faulty sewage pipe that has gurgled her to sleep each night since she was born.

The next thing she knows, her mum is back in bed beside her, shivering. Still half-asleep, Hayley hugs her to warm her up, to which her mum responds by squeezing her far too tightly. "What Happened?" demands Hayley, still under her breath.

"What Happened..." Her mum sounds small and scared and wide awake. She's trying to be normal. "Never mind for now. Get some sleep, you need to be on time for school tomorrow. I'm sure you'll hear all about What Happened then."

In fact, at school the next day, Hayley's teachers seem determined not to acknowledge that anything happened at all. They all look tired and frightened, and they whisper together when they think their pupils are busy working, but all questions about the uproar of the previous night are knocked back without a word of explanation.

Over mid-morning milk and biscuits, Hayley's classmates swap their own details about What Happened, gleaned from their families and rumours in the corridors. None of their stories quite fit together, but Hayley believes them all – even the body counts, which range from one to a thousand. There was a monster, of course, but there was also a window in time that ate space, or spewed it out, or something. There was a fire or a flood or a structural collapse, an uprising, a plot, a murder, a massacre.

Even shadier than the rumours about What Happened are the rumours about _why_ What Happened happened. It was because of the boss of the science department, says someone. Actually, says another, the boss was an innocent victim, and it was all the fault of his intern. Actually, the boss forced the intern at gunpoint. Actually, they were Lovers. (Lovers – an intriguing word – Hayley doesn't know exactly how much it entails, but it conjures up the image of her parents when they were together. In this context, she can tell, it's a bad and shameful and strangely humorous thing.)

The intern, she learns, is only a kid. Not a kid like herself, disappointingly, but a teenager, which in fact makes him ancient. The boss is dead, killed by What Happened – this is the one fact everybody can agree on – but the intern is alive and being held in custody. (Another odd word, probably something to do with pudding? She tells herself to ask her mum about it later, because her mum is smart and knows all the words.) Tonight there will be a trial, or a hearing, or a judgement, or a sentence, or a denouncement. And then, punishment.

Hayley knows the feeling in the space between doing something wrong and getting in trouble for it, when punishment is already inevitable and there's nothing you can do but wait. She wonders what kind of punishment is in store for the intern.

* * *

It feels like everyone in Sector 18 has somehow squeezed themselves into the common area. All of Hayley's classmates are here with their families, as well as her teachers, neighbours, cousins, mum's friends from work, the cleaners, the messengers, even the supervisors, all packed together in a ring around the main lift doors. Hayley grips her mum's hand as they join the back of the group. Sam, quiet for now, is nestled in his sling against her mum's chest.

Hayley squints up through the massed bodies, unsure what to expect. "We're not all going in the lift, are we?"

Her mum smiles. "No, pet. We're waiting for the convict."

"Con-vict?"

"The intern who was responsible for What Happened. He put us all in danger last night because he doesn't care about any of us, so now we all get to laugh at the look on his spoilt, guilty little face."

Hayley gazes around. "Everyone in the sector?"

"Everyone on the base! Every decent, honest, hard-working Martian is entitled to a piece of that slimeball now. They're touring him round _all_ the sectors." Her mum's hand tightens around Hayley's, and she smiles even more. "We'll get our chance soon."

All eyes are fixed on the electronic display above the lift doors as it tracks their prize's slow approach. A hiss of excitement spreads through the crowd when it starts coming into range. As the lift grinds invisibly closer and closer to Sector 18, the number rising every few seconds, people start to count out loud: 12-A, 12-B, 13-A, 13-B...

By the time it clatters to a halt on their level, the chant has broken down into woops and cheers. The heavy doors heave aside in a shower of rust flakes. Hayley can't see what comes out of the lift, but the grown-ups around her react like their team have just thrashed Sector 17 in the annual volleyball grudge match.

"Is it dangerous?" she asks her mum, shouting to be heard in the chaos.

"No," her mum grins. "They've got him tied up!" And Hayley feels the grip on her hand loosen. She knows she is being given permission – encouragement, even – to get a little closer to the action.

So Hayley slips away from her mum and weaves between the grown-up legs towards the front of the crowd, while above and behind and around her they're all chanting, cheering, swearing. As she goes, a flock of hands appear from above to guide her forwards; they want her to have a good view. They're excited for her to see what they're seeing, to feel what they're feeling.

Then she's on the front line of the mob, looking at the scene in the small and shrinking clearing beside the lift. There's a boy on his knees, eyes level with hers. His arms are tied across his chest in a strange white jacket. There are sturdy plastic rings around his neck, waist and ankles, all held on chains by the guards: five huge Reds, any one of whom alone could snap the boy like a biscuit.

He _does_ look like a kid. A kid dying in an old film. An upwards jolt of brown hair, sharp bones, bloody nose; wild, bruised eyes. For a moment, they are looking at each other. Hayley doesn't know the shape his face is making. It looks like fear but she thinks it could be evil.

Then one of the guards puts a boot on his shoulder and forces him down. Hayley shrieks along with the crowd, their voices all sliding together into a huge, happy roar as they grind his pretty white face into the floor. Someone throws an empty beer bottle, which glances off his arm and off into the throng. Someone else throws it back, but this time it misses and rolls at Hayley's feet.

As she stoops to pick it up, the guards drag the intern upright. They move his ragdoll body roughly, shaking it like they're trying to get the badness out. He stumbles when they yank the chain around his neck but manages to stay on his feet, tottering behind the guards as they haul him back towards the lift. The crowd pulls closer, their voices swelling, more anger, more triumph, more hate; trying to drag out their time. People start throwing other stuff, no more glass, just plastic cups and food and shoes, anything they have to hand. It's still exciting, the way he flinches, and the crowd erupts every time they land a hit. Over the top, she can hear babies and toddlers crying.

It's not frightening as long as she shouts with them. They're all attacking together, then, and she is safe and powerful.

The lift doors are juddering open. Hayley feels the weight of the bottle in her hand. She's good at throwing – she nearly made the junior volleyball team this year – and she knows what she has to do, while the convict's skull is still in sight, while she has the chance. She only has a few seconds, but that's enough. Imagine the cheer that will go up from her friends and neighbours and classmates! Imagine how proud she'll make every decent, honest, hard-working Martian who hears about her strike! Imagine the crunch, the blood, the fall!

The guards manhandle their prisoner into the lift and the doors clunk shut behind them. The bottle hangs still at Hayley's side. Suddenly she does not feel powerful, or safe, or part of the crowd. Why didn't you do it? asks an imaginary chorus of righteous grown-ups. Don't you want to hurt him? Don't you think he deserves it?

As the crowd breaks up, she runs back to her family. Sam is crying. Her mum, looking flushed and happier than Hayley has seen her in years, welcomes her back with a hug. "Did you get a good look?" Hayley nods. "The state of him," her mum sneers, "pathetic little toff runt. It's no wonder they're starting to lose their marbles. They marry their cousins, kiddo. Anything to avoid contact with scum like you and me."

Scum, thinks Hayley. Is that what he was thinking when their eyes met, even while she was standing in judgement over him, proud with the rest of the mob in her purple dungarees?

The show is over now, but nobody is ready to give up and go back to their pods. Laughing and congratulating one another, they mill around the common area, some drifting towards the bar and the vendibots. A queue forms against the back wall, and Hayley realises that Uncle Jim is here with his ice cream cart. He's not her real uncle (he's much nicer than any of her real uncles) but nearly every kid in Hayley's class calls him that. This abundance of honorary nieces and nephews doesn't stop him from treating every one of them like his own.

"Hayley!" Jim beams when they reach the front of the queue. "Gosh, aren't you just shooting up! I bet you're doing great at school, too – you always were a clever one." He means clever for a Purple; Hayley's grades are _not_ great, only above average for her colour. "And Christine, and little Sam! How nice to see you. Have you all been having lots of fun shaming the traitor?"

"Oh, yes." Hayley's mum puts a proud hand on her shoulder. "Hayley went right to the front of the crowd, didn't you, pet?"

Jim's eyes grow wide. "Gasp, you must have been close enough to touch him! Not that you'd want to, of course." He shudders. "You know, this is all very exciting, but I'll be glad when it's over and the whole mess is safely locked away in the past forever. As a parent, you know, how are you supposed to sleep comfortably at night when someone like that... that..."

"The term you're looking for," Hayley's mum smirks, "is True Blunatic."

Hayley doesn't know what that means, but it makes Jim wince. "Come on now, Christine, let's not hear you talking like that in front of the little ones. Evil is evil, there's no need to bring colour into it."

"That's very magnanimous of you, Jim," she laughs. "Stupid is stupid, but you can bet your arse they all sit around in their nice soft chairs and laugh about how dumb you Greens are. Not to mention us lazy Purples and those lying Oranges. They see colour, so why shouldn't we?"

"Well, I wouldn't know about that," says Jim, with an awkward chuckle. "But I always think it's best to be able to laugh at yourself. Stereotypes usually exist for a reason, after all."

"Stereotypes exist for a – ! I swear, Jim, you don't have a single critical brain cell in your head."

"Thanks!" He beams as he hands over their usual two sugar-flavoured cones. "That'll be three tokens, please. What the heck, make it two and a nice big smile from my favourite fake niece."

Hayley shows him the widest smile she can, teeth out, cheeks bulging. Her mother gives him the full three tokens anyway; she tells Hayley on the walk back to their pod that he can't afford to keep missing his targets, not with another baby on the way.

And then Jim gets his wish, and the whole episode is erased from history. Hayley knows it happened, though, because she keeps the beer bottle in her locker. She doesn't know what she's saving it for. Keeps her spare tokens in it – doesn't know what she's saving them for, either. It's not like there's anything to buy, so on her sixteenth birthday she empties it out on the bar and gets one fancy cocktail that makes her sick.

More years pass, Hayley's grades slide, her mum keeps working the karaoke booth, and the bottle starts filling up again. She doesn't tell anyone that she was supposed to throw it at David Knight. How could she, anyway, when talking about What Happened is forbidden now? Her private memory of that day still gives her the same feeling, the fear of suddenly not belonging; the deadly threat of being exposed as an intruder, a traitor, crazy and evil and different and untouchable. It's not entirely a bad feeling, once she gets used to it. It's the same feeling she gets on MYIP Preparation Day, when she sees the cheerful acceptance on her classmates' faces, and wonders what they'd say if they knew what she really wants to do with her life.

At last, she's ready to stop playing at being a secret heretic and start burning some real bridges. And if she sees David again, now that he's been resurrected, she's not going to let him get away this time.

**Author's Note:**

> This one has given me a lot of grief but I'm not going to sit around trying to improve it any more, especially since E7 is out tonight and might ruin it entirely sooo. I hope you enjoyed! Any feedback is always very much appreciated! <333


End file.
